U.S. buyout firm Advent has sold its stake in German book retailer Thalia to a family of publishers, who vowed to pursue restructuring the retailer has adopted in recent years amid rising pressure from online competitors.

The German Herder family acquired a majority stake in Thalia, which has 280 stores in Germany, Austria and Switzerland, making it the biggest book retailer in German-speaking Europe.

The parties announced the deal in a statement on Monday but did not disclose financial details. People familiar with the matter estimated that the transaction was in the lower three-digit million euro range.

The Herder family runs a long-standing German publishing house of the same name, focusing mainly on religious and spiritual content.

Advent had purchased Thalia from perfume and cosmetics retailer Douglas in 2012 and subsequently restructured the business to face up to competition from online retailers such as Amazon.

"Thalia is back on solid economic footing and is growing on its own," Advent managing partner Ranjan Sen said in the statement.

Thalia had closed 20 stores and in recent years focused on its own e-book, the Tolino, to compete with Amazon's Kindle. The retailer planned to link its store and online business further, its Chief Executive Michael Busch said.

"This is the beginning of a new chapter for our company," Thalia's Busch said. "We are gaining an entrepreneurial, long-term oriented owner structure." (Reporting by Tina Bellon; editing by David Clarke)

RT @consertum: Gute Bäume, die ihr die starr entblätterten Arme
Reckt zum Himmel und fleht wieder den Frühling herab!

#Herder

Journal of the History of Ideas, Vol. 19, No. 1 (Jan., 1958), pp. 105-113 -- see also his follow up on how the German historicist school (Meinecke et al) found what they wanted to in Herder's works, distorting Herder in the process -- downloaded pdf to Note

Journal of the History of Ideas - Vol. 21, No. 4 (Oct. - Dec., 1960), pp. 527-537 - reviews reception of Herder's 2 stages of writing about history, how they have been characterized and debated since the late 18thC, and which he thinks says as much re German intellectual currents and historicism than Herder's own thought -- downloaded pdf to Note

Sie fürchten, daß man dem Wort Humanität einen Fleck anhängen werde21; könnten wir nicht das Wort ändern? Menschheit, Menschlichkeit, Menschenrechte, Menschenpflichten, Menschenwürde, Menschenliebe?

Menschen sind wir allesamt und tragen sofern die Menschheit an uns, oder wir gehören zur Menschheit. Leider aber hat man in unserer Sprache dem Wort Mensch und noch mehr dem barmherzigen Wort Menschlichkeit so oft eine Nebenbedeutung von Niedrigkeit, Schwäche und falschem Mitleid angehängt, daß man jenes nur mit einem Blick der Verachtung, dies mit einem Achselzucken zu begleiten gewohnt ist. »Der Mensch!«22 sagen wir jammernd oder verachtend und glauben einen guten Mann aufs lindeste mit dem Ausdruck zu entschuldigen, »es habe ihn die Menschlichkeit übereilet«. Kein Vernünftiger billigt es, daß man den Charakter des Geschlechts, zu dem wir gehören, so barbarisch hinabgesetzt hat; man hat hiemit unweiser gehandelt, als wenn man den Namen seiner Stadt oder Landsmannschaft zum Ekelnamen machte. Wir also wollen uns hüten, daß wir zu Beförderung solcher Menschlichkeit keine Briefe schreiben.

Der Name Menschenrechte kann ohne Menschenpflichten nicht genannt werden; beide beziehen sich aufeinander, und für beide suchen wir ein Wort.

So auch Menschenwürde und Menschenliebe. Das Menschengeschlecht, wie es jetzt ist und wahrscheinlich lange noch[139] sein wird, hat seinem größesten Teil nach keine Würde; man darf es eher bemitleiden als verehren. Es soll aber zum Charakter seines Geschlechts, mithin auch zu dessen Wert und Würde gebildet werden. Das schöne Wort Menschenliebe ist so trivial worden, daß man meistens die Menschen liebt, um keinen unter den Menschen wirksam zu lieben. Alle diese Worte enthalten Teilbegriffe unseres Zwecks, den wir gern mit einem Ausdruck bezeichnen möchten.

Also wollen wir bei dem Wort Humanität bleiben, an welches unter Alten und Neuern die besten Schriftsteller so würdige Begriffe geknüpft haben. Humanität ist der Charakter unsres Geschlechts; er ist uns aber nur in Anlagen angeboren und muß uns eigentlich angebildet werden. Wir bringen ihn nicht fertig auf die Welt mit; auf der Welt aber soll er das Ziel unsres Bestrebens, die Summe unsrer Übungen, unser Wert sein; denn eine Angelität im Menschen kennen wir nicht, und wenn der Dämon, der uns regiert, kein humaner Dämon ist, werden wir Plagegeister der Menschen. Das Göttliche in unserm Geschletcht ist also Bildung zur Humanität; alle großen und guten Menschen, Gesetzgeber, Erfinder, Philosophen, Dichter, Künstler, jeder edle Mensch in seinem Stande, bei der Erziehung seiner Kinder, bei der Beobachtung seiner Pflichten, durch Beispiel, Werk, Institut und Lehre hat dazu mitgeholfen. Humanität ist der Schatz und die Ausbeute aller menschlichen Bemühungen, gleichsam die Kunst unsres Geschlechtes. Die Bildung zu ihr ist ein Werk, das unablässig fortgesetzt werden muß, oder wir sinken, höhere und niedere Stände, zur rohen Tierheit, zur Brutalität zurück.

Sollte das Wort Humanität also unsre Sprache verunzieren? Alle gebildete Nationen haben es in ihre Mundart aufgenommen; und wenn unsre Briefe einem Fremden in die Hand kämen, müßten sie ihm wenigstens unverfänglich scheinen; denn Briefe zu Beförderung der Brutalität wird doch kein ehrliebender Mensch wollen geschrieben haben.

28.

[140] Gern nehme ich mit Ihnen das Wort Humanität in unsre Sprache, wenigstens im Kreise unsrer Gesellschaft, auf; der Begriff, den es ausdrückt, noch mehr aber dessen Geschichte scheint ihm das Bürgerrecht zu geben.

Solange der Mensch, dies wunderbare Rätsel der Schöpfung, sich seinem sichtbaren Zustande nach betrachtete und sich dabei mit dem, was in ihm lag, mit seinen Anlagen und Willenskräften, oder gar mit äußern Gegenständen der daurenden Natur verglich, so ward er auf das Gefühl der Hinfälligkeit, der Schwäche und Krankheit zurückgestoßen; daher in mehreren morgenländischen Schriften dieser Begriffe dem Namen unsres Geschlechts ursprünglich beigesellet ist. Der Mensch ist von Erde, eine zerbrechliche, von einem flüchtigen Odem durchhauchte Leimhütte; sein Leben ist ein Schatte, sein Los ist Mühe auf Erden.

Schon dieser Begriff führte zur Menschlichkeit, d.i. zum erbarmenden Mitgefühl des Leidens seiner Nebenmenschen, zur Teilnahme an den Unvollkommenheiten ihrer Natur, mit dem Bestreben, diesen zuvorzukommen oder ihnen abzuhelfen. Die Morgenländer sind so reich an Sittensprüchen und Einkleidungen, die dies Menschengefühl als Pflicht einschärfen oder als eine unserm Geschlecht unentbehrliche Tugend empfehlen, daß es sehr ungerecht wäre, ihnen Humanität abzusprechen, weil sie dies Wort nicht besaßen.

Die Griechen hatten für den Menschen einen edleren Namen: ανϑρωπος, ein Aufwärtsblickender, der sein Antlitz und Auge aufrecht empor trägt, oder, wie Plato es noch künstlicher deutet, einer, der, indem er sieht, auch überzählt und rechnet. Sie konnten indessen ebensowenig umhin, in diesem aufrechtblickenden, vernunftartigen Geschlecht alle die Mängel zu bemerken, die zum bedaurenden Mitgefühl, also zur Humanität und zur Gesellung führen.

By the end of the eighteenth century, then, scientists had constructed a taxonomy of nature into which humans could be fitted and out of which emerged the categories of race. This seems to lend credibility to the view that it is modernity itself, and in particular the Enlightenment, that give rise both to the idea of race and to the practice of racism. ‘Eighteenth century Europe was the cradle of racism’, the historian George Mosse, argues because ‘racism has its foundations’ in the Enlightenment ‘preoccupation with a rational universe, nature and aesthetics.’ To see why this is not the case, we need to look more closely at how Enlightenment thinkers viewed the concept of human differences. -- If any event could demonstrate the folly of giving into unreason, it is surely Nazism and the Holocaust. Yet now it is regarded as an expression of too much reason.There is no intrinsic link between the idea of race and a rational or scientific view of the world. On the contrary: what made ideas of race plausible were the growth of political sentiments hostile to both the rationalism and the humanism of the Enlightenment.

For its competition of 1771, the Berlin Academy of Sciences asked: "Supposing men abandoned to their natural faculties, are they in a position to invent language? And by what means will they arrive at this invention?" The winning essay was Herder's "On the Origin of Language." This was actually the Academy's 2nd on language. In 1759 they asked: "What is the reciprocal influence of the opinions of people on language, and of language on opinions?" The winner was the orientalist Johann David Michaelis. Lifschitz's lucid and engaging book is about the 1759 contest, as he considers the historical, philosophical, and political circumstances that led to its proposal and the broader scholarly views of Michaelis. -- While one might quibble with Lifschitz's attempt to find deep roots in the Leibnizian-Wolffian philosophy for the 1759 Academy question, there is no doubting that in Berlin of the 1750s a number of thinkers took an active interest in language, its role in framing social institutions, and its relation to the mind, primarily under the influence of the work of Condillac and Rousseau. These include the president of the Academy, Maupertuis, and Moses Mendelssohn There was also lively discussion among Academy members regarding the (synchronic) connection between language and opinions, esp French as the language of the Academy. -- Already in the 1750s ...mainstream Enlightenment figures recognized the "linguistic rootedness of all human forms of life" and the importance of language as a "tool of cognition". Lifschitz rightly contends [this counters the story that such a view ], with its focus on the historical and non-rational aspects of human nature, [came from counter-Enlightenment figures] such as Herder and Hamann. [This directly] challenge[s] the characterization ... in Isaiah Berlin's seminal studies [as well as more recent studies] such as Michael Forster's work on Herder's philosophy of language. ...Herder's claim, as characterized by Forster, that "thought is essentially dependent upon and bounded by language" and that "one cannot think unless one has a language and one can only think what one can express linguistically" must be taken in the broader context of these earlier philosophical (and political) debates.

Michael Forster, After Herder: Philosophy of Language in the German Tradition, Oxford University Press, 2010, 482pp., $99.00 (hbk), ISBN 9780199228119. -**- Michael Forster, German Philosophy of Language: From Schlegel to Hegel and Beyond, Oxford University Press, 2011, 350pp., $85.00 (hbk), ISBN 9780199604814. -**- Reviewed by Fred Rush, University of Notre Dame

Literature survey - major shift in understanding Herder and debunking irrationalism, ethnic nationalism and other myths (exacerbated by Berlin? ) -- downloaded pdf to Note

Champis - the herding rabbit Who needs sheepdogs when there are... rabbits ! Do you want to know more about Champis: http://www.gardsbacken.blogspot.com

see also http://www.cs.ox.ac.uk/stephen.cameron/sheepdog/

RT @heyyouapp #iPhone #App #Alpaca #Herder - #Utilities #single #dating #transfer #app #ios #6 #1 #4 #jailbreak...

JSTOR: The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Vol. 65, No. 4 (Autumn, 2007), pp. 353-368 -- downloaded pdf to Note

JSTOR: ELH, Vol. 73, No. 4 (Winter, 2006), pp. 831-853 -- downloaded pdf to Note -- questions assumptions like those of Raymond Williams who don't see these issues showing up until Herder and 19thC (with exception of Vico)

JSTOR: Journal of the History of Ideas, Vol. 68, No. 4 (Oct., 2007), pp. 635-658 -- downloaded pdf to Note

Project MUSE - John H. Zammito. and Karl Menges. and Ernest A. Menze. "Johann Gottfried Herder Revisited: The Revolution in Scholarship in the Last Quarter Century." Journal of the History of Ideas 71.4 (2010): 661-684.  -- A veritable tidal shift in Herder scholarship has taken place over the last quarter century, primarily but not exclusively in German. This review essay seeks to evoke the richness and vitality of this revival with the hope of persuading American academics that some ill-founded opinions still circulating concerning Herder's "irrationalism" and chauvinistic, even racist nationalism, and his philosophical naivety and literary effrontery, might at last be put to rest. The recent revival has brought sharply to the fore two crucial aspects of Herder. First, there is the contribution of Herder's thought to the emergent cultural and social sciences. Second, for Herder the "science of man" was also a natural science: the division between the humanities and the natural sciences that has been such a hallmark of the age from Kant until very recently did not exist for Herder. -- not yet open access on jstor

JSTOR: Journal of the History of Ideas, Vol. 70, No. 1 (Jan., 2009), pp. 93-118 -- downloaded pdf to Note -- needless to say, Betz doesn't think much of either Berlin's Counter-Enlightenment or his treatment of Hamann

Avi Lifschitz is Lecturer in Early Modern European History at University College London (UCL); in 2012/13 he is Research Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study (Wissenschaftskolleg) in Berlin. He is the author of Language and Enlightenment: The Berlin Debates of the Eighteenth Century, available in print from Oxford University Press and online from Oxford Scholarship Online, and co-editor of Epicurus in the Enlightenment (2009)

From Riga to Glasgow and from Berlin down to Naples, Enlightenment authors asked themselves how language could have evolved among initially animal-like human beings. Some of them suggested some continuities between bestial and human communication, though most thinkers pointed to a strict barrier separating human language from vocal and gestural exchange among animals. In broad lines, this period witnessed a transition from an earlier theory of language, which saw our words as mirroring self-standing ideas, to the modern notion that signs are precisely what enables us to form our ideas in the first place. Such signs had, however, to be artificially crafted by human beings themselves; after all, natural sounds and gestures are also used by animals.

The open and malleable character of the eighteenth-century Republic of Letters is found in a wide variety of authors: Leibniz, Wolff, Condillac, Rousseau, Michaelis, and Herder, among others. The language debates demonstrate that German theories of culture and language were not merely a rejection of French ideas. New notions of the genius of language and its role in cognition were constructed through a complex interaction with cross-European currents, especially via the prize contests at the Berlin Academy.

Introduction
1. The mutual emergence of language, mind, and society: an Enlightenment debate
2. Symbolic cognition from Leibniz to the 1760s: theology, aesthetics, and history
3. The evolution and genius of language: debates in the Berlin Academy
4. J. D. Michaelis on language and vowel points: from confessional controversy to naturalism
5. A point of convergence and new departures: the 1759 contest on language and opinions
6. Language and cultural identity: the controversy over Premontval's Preservatif
7. Tackling the naturalistic conundrum: instincts and conjectural history to 1771
8. Conclusion and a glimpse into the future